Remembering the Tate-Labianca Murders 55 Years Later

Charles Manson’s followers killed seven people in two days in the Los Angeles area in 1969

It has been 55 years since the Tate-Labianca murders took place on Aug. 9 and 10 in 1969 at the hands of Charles Manson and his followers. Over the span of two days, seven people were brutally killed at two different homes in the Los Angeles area.

Manson, who had been in and out of jail during his early years for petty crimes, reinvented himself in the ‘60s as the leader of a group of young followers. He often targeted teenage girls who ran away from home or were otherwise on their own to join his group which became known as the “Manson Family.”

According to court documents, he convinced his followers that these murders were needed to create “an impending bloody, civilization-ending, worldwide race war between Blacks and Whites.”

On August 9, 1969, he ordered three of his female followers  — Susan Atkins, Patricia Krenwinkel and Leslie Van Houten — to go to the home of actress Sharon Tate and her husband director Roman Polanski and kill everyone there. The three murdered Tate and four of her friends — Wojciech Frykowski, Abigail Folger, Steven Parent and Jay Sebring.

Tate, who was eight and a half months pregnant at the time, begged Manson’s followers to spare her and her unborn child. She was stabbed 16 times and had an “X” carved into her stomach.

Manson’s followers struck again the following day at the Los Feliz home of Leno and Rosemary LaBianca. The couple owned a chain of local grocery stores and were not connected to Tate or her friends. When police found their bodies, the word “war” was carved into Leno’s stomach and “Helter Skelter,” a song by the Beatles, was scrawled on their refrigerator in blood.

Manson was arrested and found hiding in a bathroom cabinet in a run-down house in Death Valley, Calif., two months later. During that time, the Manson Family killed another man named Donald “Shorty” Shea in late August 1969. Shea was a horse wrangler and per The Los Angeles Times, it is believed that the group thought he was a police informant. His body was found eight years later.

Here’s everything to know about the Manson Family members:

Who Were The Members?
While the murders terrified residents in Los Angeles and many flocked to gun stores to purchase firearms for their protection, people across the nation became equally fascinated and disturbed as more details about the murders were released. But what shocked most was that the murderers were all young women.

Atkins met Manson in 1967 after running away from home as a teen and working as a topless dancer in San Francisco. Houten was a former high school cheerleader and homecoming queen and met Manson on the outskirts of Los Angeles. Krenwinkel met Manson at a party when she was a 19-year-old secretary and left her life behind just three days later to follow him. Atkins and Krenwinkel were 21 at the time of the murders while Van Houten was only 19.

The Prison Sentences
Manson was found legally responsible for the murders since they were carried out on his instruction. After a nine-month trial, he and his followers were all sentenced to death for their role in the Tate-Labianca murders and other killings, according to CNN. One year later, their sentence was reduced to life in prison after California abolished the death penalty. In 2017, Manson died at the age of 83 after spending nearly 50 years in prison.

Atkins was convicted for her involvement in the Tate-Labianca murders and the murder of musician Gary Hinman in July 1969. She served life in prison and died of cancer in 2009 at the age of 61, according to NBC San Diego.

During the trial, she testified that she was stoned on acid during the murders. “I don’t know how many times I stabbed [Tate] and I don’t know why I stabbed her,” she said according to The New York Times. “She said, ‘Please don’t kill me,’ and I told her to shut up, and I threw her down on the couch.”

Van Houten, 74, served 53 years in prison before she was released on parole in 2023 after being denied more than 20 times, according to NPR. While in prison, she earned a bachelor’s and master’s degree. She is the only one involved in the murders to be granted parole.

Krenwinkel, 76, was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole. In October 2022, California Gov. Gavin Newsom blocked her 15th request for parole claiming she “still poses an unreasonable danger to society if paroled at this time,” the Los Angeles Times reported.

She is the longest-serving female inmate in California.